Skills shortage hitting UK tech

TECHNOLOGY firms in London are suffering from a skills shortage, with companies having to pay increasingly high salaries to recruit appropriate talent.

Figures seen by City A.M. reveal that salaries for technology jobs in London have risen by 26 per cent in the last year – a much faster rate than for the rest of the country – and that vacancies in the capital are at an all-time high.

The average salary for a vacant technology role in London is now £48,307, compared to £38,274 a year ago and a national average of £38,185, according to figures from job listings service Adzuna. There are now 50,715 technology vacancies in the UK, a record level.

The figures suggest a chasm between supply and demand in the capital, and the news that will come as a blow to the government’s Tech City initiative, which aims to foster London’s technology startups.

Michael Acton Smith, the founder of Mind Candy, one of London’s most successful young technology firms, told City A.M. that the shortfall in adequate talent means having to look overseas.

“What worries us is that it means it takes companies longer to get projects done,” he said.

“In the long term we have to start improving skills, in the short term we are having to go further afield [to recruit].”